


Swim Until You Can't See Land

by bashert



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-11
Updated: 2014-01-11
Packaged: 2018-01-08 07:32:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1129985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bashert/pseuds/bashert
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will just wants to make sure Mackenzie is okay. </p>
<p>Post- Red Team III.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Swim Until You Can't See Land

**Author's Note:**

> The title for this comes from the Frightened Rabbits song. And yeah. Thanks for reading! If I could, I'd buy every single one of you a beer.

Will shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels. A well placed hundred and a charming smile had granted him access to her building, and now he stood in front of her apartment door not entirely sure what he was doing there.

It was possible that she wasn't even home. He had no idea where she had gone, but she had hightailed it the hell out of there after the show. He had tried to intercept her, but she was too quick, and she was already out the door by the time he had yanked off the earpiece and rushed out of the studio.

The show that night, _Jesus_ , it wasn't one of his proudest moments. He had to systematically dismantle all the hard work they had all done over the past year; admit they were wrong and attempt to apologize for their huge, glaring errors.

"We have to retract Genoa tonight. All of it," she had said, her mouth quivering and her eyes watering. The staff was quiet, their eyes darting from Mac to Will, their breaths collectively held. It seemed all the air was sucked out of the room, and they all stood, still as statues, unsure what to do until finally Will asked for the room. Mac had stepped aside to let them pass, and Jim was the last to go out, stopping in front of Mac and putting a gentle hand on her arm.

"You okay?" He asked and for a moment it looked like she was going to brush off his concerns, but her mouth drew into a tight line and she shook her head almost imperceptibly. "Mac, it's not..." Jim started, but she put up a hand to stop him.

"Not now, okay? Later. Later you can try to tell me that, but not right now," her voice was firm and Jim simply nodded, giving her arm a squeeze before slipping out of the office. Will lit a cigarette as Jim shut the door behind him to do something with his hands that didn't involve pulling her into his arms. He knew her well enough to know that she didn't want to be coddled at the moment. But still. She looked so broken standing there, and a crying Mac had always been one of his weaknesses.

"What the hell happened?" Will asked. "I thought we were standing by the story. I thought we had all agreed."

"He doctored the tape, Will," Mac explained. "Jerry Fucking Dantana doctored the raw footage." The lit cigarette fell limply to Will's side as he gaped at Mac. It was hard for Will to wrap his mind around the sheer stupidity of that move. And maybe even more than that, the sheer cockiness.

  
**"** What?" Will thundered. "Did he admit it? How do you know?"

"He missed the shot clock," she muttered, her arms wrapping even more tightly around herself.

"Excuse me?"

"The shot clock, in the game that playing behind Stomtonovich," Mac replied. "It jumps. I was looking at the footage and I noticed that the shot clock jumps from 19 to 3 to 14 to 2."  Will remembered the cigarette still hanging between his fingers and brought it up to his mouth to take a long drag, closing his eyes for a moment. She was a fucking genius.

"You're goddamn Nancy Drew, you know that?" He murmured as he stubbed out his cigarette. She gave out a short, bitter laugh that sounded more liquid than solid and then clamped her hand over her mouth. He couldn't take it anymore, and he straightened and crossed the short distance to her and gathered her into his arms.

He didn't offer any ridiculous platitudes. He didn't tell her it would be okay, because who the fuck knew if it would be? He didn't tell her that it wasn't her fault, even if it _wasn't_ , because he knew better. Will just held her, and she was stiff in his arms at first, until she buried her face in his chest and her fingers dug into his back, bunching his sweater in her hands.

Once her breathing had evened and she seemed calmer, he pulled back slightly and finally asked if she was okay. She hesitated and then nodded. He watched as she squared her shoulders, steeling herself for battle.

"We're going to have to rework the whole show tonight," Mac sighed. "This will be the A Block." She gave one more shuddering sigh before offering him a wan smile. "I fired him. Jerry Dantana. _That_ felt good." There were many things that Will wanted to do at the moment to Jerry Dantana, and he didn't begrudge her the pleasure of being the one to fire that smarmy asshole. Will never liked him, and he knew that Mac hadn't either.

"Good," Will said. "What a prick." And for some reason that struck Mac as funny and she dissolved into borderline hysterical giggles.

"Oh Jesus," she finally said. "We're all going to lose our jobs." She sobered up and looked on the verge of tears again. " _They're_ all going to lose their jobs."

"Mac," he began and she shook her head.

"No, it's fine, I have to go, we have a ton of work to do before tonight," she waved off his concern. "I'll see you in the rundown."

She was a force for the rest of the day, but had been unusually quiet in his ear during the show. He hadn't been surprised to find that she had hurried out of there before he could get to her, but he was disappointed. Sloan had grabbed him by the elbow as he went to his office to change.

"We're all going down to Hang Chew's to try to drown our sorrows," Sloan said.

"Is that where Mac went?" Will asked, even though he knew the answer was no.

"I don't think so," Sloan shook her head. She frowned a little. "It's not her fault, Will. I mean, Jesus, without her Sherlock Holmes-ing the footage, who knows how long it would have taken us to realize we had gotten it all wrong?"

"I know that, and you know that," he said helplessly. "I'm going to pass on Hang Chew's, thanks though." He dug out his wallet and handed Sloan some money. "Buy a couple of rounds on me." He changed in record speed, and didn't realize his plan was to go find Mac until he ended up in front of her building.

And then in front of her door.

He took a deep breath and knocked hard a couple of times.

"Mac? It's me," he called. There was a shuffle on the other side before he heard the locks turn and she pulled open the door. She had already changed out of her work clothes into a pair of sweatpants and an oversized University of Nebraska sweatshirt that he had given up for lost years ago.

"You don't need to check on me," she sighed. "I'm okay."

"You're not," he said bluntly. She gave another sigh and moved to the side to let him in. She retreated to her couch and curled up in a corner. "Everyone else went to Hang Chew's."

"I know, I was invited," Mac answered. "I wasn't really in the mood for company." She said this last part pointedly, and he ignored it, shrugging off his jacket and dropping into a chair across from her.

"It's not your fault," he offered.

"Will."

"It's not."

"It's not _only_ my fault," she acknowledged. "But _I'm_ the EP."

"You held off for a lot longer than anyone else with the information you had would have," Will pointed out.

"Still," her voice was almost wistful. "You did good tonight. All things considered." She took a long drink of wine. "I think I'm going to go back to London. If we lose our jobs, I mean."

"We're not going to lose our jobs," Will chose to address that first, because the other part of her sentence, the part where she runs off to London? He doesn't want to even imagine. London was a hell of a lot safer than a war zone, but it was still an ocean away. If she went to London, that was it for them. He was a smart man, and he was smart enough to know that. It wasn't as if they were friends, although they weren't exactly _not_ friends either, fuck, Will wasn't sure what they were. He hadn't dated anyone since the disaster that was Nina Howard, and as far as he knew (and he actually knew _a lot_ thanks to Sloan and Charlie and their constant meddling), Mac wasn't dating anyone seriously. Or anyone at all, really, but he knew that was partly because she had poured every spare moment into working on Genoa. They were both single and he was getting there, damn it. He was getting to a place where he could forgive her, could move on with her, and that would never happen if she took off for London, if they were forced apart because of Jerry Fucking Dantana.

If Will could get his hands on Dantana, he'd ring his fucking neck.

"You can't say that for certain," Mac replied morosely. "We _could_ lose our jobs. We actually _should_ lose our jobs. We reported on a war crime that never happened. I just...if that happens, I want to try to protect our staff." As if there was a switch, she sat up straighter and seemed determined. "Will, I mean it. If it comes down to it, I'll take the fall. I'll take the responsibility. If it means you keep doing the news with our team, I'll do it. Jim can take over for me, he's ready," at Will's raised eyebrow, she amended, "he's nearly ready, at least."

"Stop it," Will ordered. "You aren't taking the fall for anyone." She crumpled in on herself then, her breath catching. Will took the wine glass from her hands and for the second time that day he pulled her to him and folded his body around hers.

Will wasn't sure how to proceed. He had no answers for her. He wasn't sure what was going to happen. He knew that whatever happened, it wouldn't be good. He knew that things were going to get a hell of a lot worse before they could possibly get better. They falsely reported a story that had huge implications.

"No one is ever going to trust us again," Mac's voice was little more than a whisper. "No one. No one."

He couldn't reassure her that wasn't true, because it _was_. They were made to look like idiots. Fools. He was angry, and upset, but not at her. Will had a source too, one that he thought was impeachable, and look how that turned out.

"Then we work harder, try harder," he finally replied. "We start over again and do our jobs the best we can. I don't know what's going to happen, but there will be plenty of time to worry about it. Tomorrow. We'll worry about it tomorrow. Right now, I want you to point me in the direction of your hard liquor, because fuck wine. I'm sorry. I know you love that shit, but it was a hard day and there will plenty more like it, and I need to forgot my own name for a while." Before he could stop himself, he brushed a kiss to the top of her head, and reluctantly let go of Mac, climbing to his feet and slipping off his shoes and tugging off his sweater to just the t-shirt underneath.

"What are you doing?" Mac asked, but her voice held an edge of amusement.

"We're getting drunk, Mac. Totally shitfaced," he answered. "So come on. Show me where you keep the good stuff." Mac brought out two glasses and a bottle of scotch that had come from her father, and poured them each a generous glass. She held hers up to toast.

"To the silver lining in all of this," Mac suggested. "That if the whole news division is going down in flames, that includes Jane Barrow."

"I'll drink to that," Will clinked his glass against her. "That we never have to see Jerry Dantana's weasly fucking face again."

"Hear, hear!" Mac took a drink. "That at the very least our government was _not_ using sarin gas on civilians." Will drained his glass and reached for the bottle to pour himself another. 

"We'll figure something out," Will told her. Her cheeks were flushed from the alcohol, and her hair had fallen out of its ponytail, and he wanted to pull her to him again, but he wasn't brave enough or stupid enough or _something_ enough to try that. Instead he gripped the scotch in his hands and tried to believe his own words. To Mac's credit, she didn't scoff at his attempt to reassure them both, and instead gave a small shrug.

"Sure," she answered. "We'll figure something out." But he saw it in her eyes. She was already calculating how to sacrifice herself to save the others. She was already planning on jumping on the grenade. And he understood, he did, because he already knew that he would quit and she could keep her job. She could bring Elliott in and keep their team intact. Will was the face of  _News Night_ , and no one outside the business knew who the Executive Producer was. The network could shitcan him and everyone else could keep their jobs. They could get the trust of the audience back, but they had to do it without him.

And they couldn't do it without her.

Will could feel the scotch start to warm him, and this time, fueled by alcohol, he let himself reach out and take her hand.

"We're going to be all right," he said, his voice firmer and more confident this time. And she squeezed his hand as she took a long drink, but didn't dispute his words.

"We'll worry about it tomorrow," she reminded him with a small, crooked smile.

"Right," he nodded. "Tomorrow." 


End file.
